This we all should know: A bowel movement is the last stop in the passage of food through the digestive tract. It is what is left after your stomach, small and large intestines and colon have absorbed all the nutrients and fluids from whatever you had to eat and drink.

There are no set rules for bowel movements as everyone is different, but if you have three meals a day, you should be going three times a day.

Why? The very act of eating triggers the digestive tract into a series of deliberate rhythmic muscle contractions that push waste down the line to elimination. It generally works on a 24-hour cycle, so if you have three meals a day and need to eliminate after breakfast, what you pass should be what’s left from yesterday’s breakfast. If not, your diet or lifestyle are most likely slowing you down, causing unwelcome side effects like flatulence, bloating and reduced appetite. The longer this continues, the more clogged up you get with food that has no fibre (such as meat) and toxic waste. It can accumulate for years and end up as black and hard as tyre rubber.

Why do we need to maintain excellent bowel health?
Because the digestive system does a lot more than just handle digestion!

Check out the article Two brains better than one to find out why a healthy bowel makes for a happy human.